[d-embed id=”let-it-go-disney-characters”]
Brian Hull, who grew up in Mansfield and is now a senior music major at Dallas Baptist University, set the Internet afire this weekend with his rendition of the hit song “Let It Go” from Frozen. He’d heard about a contest where the best cover of the young-girl anthem won a $100 Disney Store gift card, and thought to himself, hey, I’d like a hundred bucks. So he sang the song as different Disney characters. As of this morning, the video had nearly 5 million views and climbing. (It received about a million views overnight.) I have sources in Mansfield — never you mind who — and they put me in contact with Hull for a quick Q&A.
Who the heck are you? I am Brian Hull, and I am a student at DBU. I’m from Mansfield, and I am a senior music major, specifically in Vocal Performance.
When did you start doing voices? Do you do commercial work or how do you take advantage of this skill? Well I’ve really been doing them as long as I can remember, but none of them were very good until I refined them around 7th grade. I am not in commercial work right now, but I’m open to opportunities in the future. Right now I just do it for friends, family, and for fun.
How did this idea come about? Well I found out about a contest where you could make your own cover of “Let it Go” and the grand prize was a $100 gift card to the Disney Store. So I decided to make one, and I just thought to myself, “What if Disney characters sang it?” I told my friends and family about it and they all encouraged me to do it, so my mom and I sat down, planned it out, and then had it recorded the next day. I was about to post it to the contest when I started to have second thoughts about how good it was, so I posted it on Facebook just so my friends could tell me what they thought. And then after about 20 minutes I decided by the feedback, it was good enough to submit it into the contest. The next thing I know, they shared it well over 300 times and shot this video into the stratosphere.
[Yes, his answer here mirrored the one he gave the Huffington Post. So he’s good with the copy and the paste. Deal with it.]
Where did you record it? At the recording studio at DBU.
What has the feedback been like? What’s been the coolest/most unexpected response? The feedback has been phenomenal! The most unexpected were the messages about how this video helped people smile through a tough situation. Like a couple where the husband had cancer. They told me this video made them smile through their difficult situation, and a church that had a devastating tragedy in their youth group when a bus crashed is now showing this to their group and its making them all smile.
Have you gotten any voice-work type offers out of this? Not yet, but I’m hoping to see some soon.
Are you savoring your 15 minutes of fame? Or trying to extend it? Well my jaw dropped when I saw the responses and this is all fantastic! But with all of this unexpected success, I’m hoping to be able to go and start using my talents, specifically voice acting, to help start a career.
Anything I missed you’d like to note? The thing that I am most excited to see is how many smiles this is causing. I have a motto where if you can make one person smile, your day was worth living. So, these three days have been the most fulfilling days of my life.
